Native Americans make up just 0.18 percent of USA Swimming members. The head age group coach for King Marlins Swim Club in Oklahoma City, Kathy Mendez, found this troubling and took the initiative to do something about it by creating the Native American Swim Weekend.

We received nominations for so many amazing volunteers from around the country and it was hard to choose just one. However, we excited to announce Francis Balmaceda from Palo Alto Stanford Aquatics as our #1VolunTeam Concessions Connoisseur Award winner.

Six members of the USA Swimming National Team are among the open-water-swimming standouts expected to compete at the second-annual Crippen Cup 10-kilometer Marathon Invitational, set for Saturday in Fort Myers, Florida.

Every week in this new series, I will dissect a word, term, or phrase of "Swim Speak." This is geared for new swim parents who are baffled and/or confused by the weird little culture within the chlorinated confines of the pool. The "Wednesday Word" is intended to be humorous with a small iota of actual information. Enjoy.

Here are some of the responses we received from swimming volunteers across the nation on what they thought was the most rewarding part of being a volunteer. Tell us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter what you find most rewarding with the hashtag #1VolunTeam.

Nothing like a 100 record and making history for Sugar Land, Texas native and Stanford standout Simone Manuel at NCAAs over the weekend. She talks about that and more in this 20 Question Tuesday Extra.

Natalie Hinds is making history. The Midland, Texas, native and University of Florida All-American joined Stanford’s Simone Manuel and Lia Neal for a 1-2-3 finish at NCAAs in the 100 free last weekend.

Kara Lynn Joyce Williamson knows that her many years in the sport have given her multiple life rewards, great friendships, discipline and a tremendous confidence in whatever path she takes in the future.

Everything you have heard about SXSW in Austin, Texas, is true. We had the chance to attend for the first time. We wanted to share our observations and some of the top trends, primarily through the sports organization lens.

Every week, I will dissect a word, term, or phrase of "Swim Speak." This is for new swim parents who are baffled and/or confused by the weird little culture within the chlorinated confines of the pool.

Welcome, Swimmers!

USA Swimming is made up of 400,000 swimmers. From big to small, fast to not-so-fast, the world of swimming is a fun, competitive, healthy world. From the 8-year-old working toward their first swim meet to the 22-year-old heroes on the blocks at the Olympic Games, USA Swimming athletes come in all shapes and sizes. In this section, you will find out how you can be a part of this exciting world!

America's Swim Team Athlete Focus

Meet Your America’s Swim Team teammates!

Did you know that as a member of USA Swimming, you are on the same team as 400,000 other swimmers across the country? Yep, your team includes heroes like Ryan Lochte and Natalie Coughlin, as well as all the kids on this page. Whether you swim in Eureka or Topeka, you are a member of America’s Swim Team!

western Zone

Name: Ashley SandAge: 12Team: East Bay Bat RaysRole Models: Carson Sand (my brother), Missy Franklin and Rebecca SoniFavorite Stroke: BreaststrokeFavorite Events: 100 Breaststroke and 200 Breaststroke Favorite Swimmers: Michael Phelps, Rebecca Soni, and Missy Franklin Future Goal: Go to Cal Berkeley and become an Olympic swimmerHobbies: Swimming and playing with my dogsFamous person you'd like to meet: Michael PhelpsFavorite Book: If I StayFavorite Movie: The Fault in Our StarsWhen I Grow Up I Want To Be: An Olympic SwimmerIf I Could Change One Thing It Would Be: That there is no such thing as cancer

Want to see your profile in Splash Magazine or on usaswimming.org? Answer all of the questions above and send your answers and a photo to splash@usaswimming.org. To see more of your America's Swim Team teammates, visit our Athlete Focus archive.

Natalie Hinds is making history. The Midland, Texas, native and University of Florida All-American joined Stanford’s Simone Manuel and Lia Neal for a 1-2-3 finish at NCAAs in the 100 free last weekend.

Andrew Gemmell and his dad, Bruce, have a somewhat complicated relationship. There’s the father-son bloodline that’s provided both good and bad circumstances and outcomes. It’s because of this that their connection as coach and pupil has developed its own set of interesting circumstances over time.

Arizona’s Kevin Cordes now has an American record to count to his credits, but he’s looking for more. The transition to long course swimmer is still a work in progress, but he’s not about to back down. He talks about that and more in this week’s 20 Question Tuesday.

In March I wrote an article about incorporating certain types of dryland training to improve fitness and athleticism. After that article was posted, I received a lot of feedback and questions from both athletes and coaches. The most common of these questions was, “What about yoga?”

Even minor mistakes when it comes to head position can throw off a swimmer’s body line significantly. Over the past few months I have started to take notice of how many athletes have poor head position, and how much this can affect their body line.

In this forum I have had the opportunity to write about the USA Swimming National Team blood chemistry program. This past April, the impact of the blood chemistry program was presented to the coaches in attendance at the National Team Coaches Seminar in Colorado Springs.

This free web presentation gives an easily understood and detailed analysis of how butterfly is swum properly and effectively. Using video and pictures for demonstration, the foundation for the best stroke for most swimmers is established.

USASwimming.org nutrition contributor, Jill Castle, recently published “Fearless Feeding: How to Raise Healthy Eaters from High Chair to High School,” and I asked her to offer her top tips for feeding teen swimmers. Many of our readers are looking for sound nutrition advice with practical tips for families of active swimmers and this book is the go-to source.

With the summer championship meets just around the corner, a lot of athletes and coaches are working to finalize the details of their race-day plans. While there is something to be said about the calm and confidence that can be gained through following a routine, the ability to be flexible and adapt to situations is something that gives elite athletes an edge.

Your training and health being equal, what you concentrate on at meets is the main cause of your best and worst swims. When you struggle with going faster in practice than races, faster in your off-events than your best ones or being unable to break through and get a certain time, faulty concentration is usually the main cause.

Also known as the marathon event, the 10K open water race is perceived as a long, steady-paced swim. The 2012 London Olympic race proved that it is anything but. In fact, successful pool swimming can make open water success very attainable.

At last weekend’s Mesa Grand Prix, I had a number of conversations with various people about how the meet “felt like” the beginning of the ramp up to World Championship Trials. For a number of reasons – strong international field, new location and facility, summer-like conditions, big crowds – Mesa seemed to mark a change in approach and intensity.

Colorado Springs played host to the National Junior Team Camp last Thursday through Saturday, and there was no shortage of lessons to be learned. The two that stood out most to me were the importance of peer coaching and creating the right culture.

Conventional wisdom says that lung capacity cannot be increased. There are mechanisms for athletes to increase how efficiently they use the oxygen they inspire, but increasing the actual capacity of the lungs is considered to be a dodgy proposition. But, wait a minute!

In backstroke, it’s widely known the hands should enter pinky-finger first and above the shoulder or just outside of the shoulder. Yet one of the most common and recognizable flaws are hand entries that are too narrow and/or with the back of the hand. Why is that?

As a follow up to my previous article on Olympic Trials Progressions, I did some research into how our team went on to perform at the Olympics. We collected information from 56 total swims (52 individual swims plus 4 relay leadoffs) and tracked the best Olympic performance compared to each athlete’s lifetime best and their fastest performance at Trials.

Tempo is an involved topic, but for mature senior athletes and their coaches, having at least an awareness of tempo can be valuable. Some coaches use tempo as a regular training measure, and these numbers show what the best in the country are racing at. Here the tempos for the top 8 male performers at 2012 US Olympic Trials.

In the weeks and months that follow an Olympic Games, we spend a lot of time looking at who made the team and how they got there. One of the things I have been looking at recently is the progressions these athletes follow during Olympic Trials.

The best way for coaches to avoid their athletes experiencing Overtraining Syndrome is to recognize when they have begun to overreach. In reality, few athletes are ever over-trained, but all athletes experience overreaching.

Recently, I have written two articles about the path our 2012 Olympic athletes and medalists took to London. This article is going to continue to expand upon that research and look at the progression of our Olympic rosters as a whole over the last few Olympic cycles, in particular the age of our Olympic qualifying athletes.

It’s that time of year again… a new beginning. The time when we all commit to New Year’s Resolutions. If you are like most Americans, you will make it your goal to do something, or not do something, for the next year. But how many of us actually keep these resolutions?

It’s pretty clear that the trend in distance races is to six-beat kick the whole race. The evidence is strong. The current trend of six-beat kicking can translate down to a good 400 and 200. In other words, SPEED, which is absolutely essential to a competitive 800 and 1500 now.

Last month I wrote about the developmental tracks taken by our 2012 Olympic Team in terms of their participation in previous USA Swimming camps and competitions. This month I am going to discuss similar research that we have done on our medalists and the progression by which they came to their success in London.

The London Olympics saw eight different world records broken, including the men’s 1500m freestyle, in which Sun Yang dropped his own world record by more than three seconds. Only three men have swum a sub-14:40 race in a textile suit, and Sun Yang has done it three times. So how does he do it and what does is mean?

Breaststrokers need to be able to change gears to find speed at the end of a race. That ability is driven by your technique and emphasis on driving the body, arms, and hands forward; minimal emphasis on pulling a lot of water back.

We at the National Team Division are turning the page on a successful London Olympics and are beginning to look forward to 2016. As such, rather than the usual discussion of something technical you can do in the water, this article is going to focus on the path by which our 2012 Olympic athletes came to qualify for and compete at the games.

I have my two last high school championship meets coming up within the next month. I have worked hard in a lot of the practices, but, admittedly, not all of them. How can I stop second guessing my training?

At the beginning of the swim season, I had to stop because of my health. I have been out of the water for almost five months. I'm really excited to get back to training, but how can I not feel so discouraged when training?

When I dive in, my heart pumps. Underwater, I listen to it. The faster I go, my heart beats louder, like a drum. In these empty, weightless waters, with each stroke, with each length, the beat gets louder. For this, I’m thankful.

I'm a sophomore in high school and I've dedicated my life to swimming since third grade. I've faced the harsh reality that I'm not fast enough to swim in college and now I'm wondering if there's a point to all this?

As I type this blog, flu medicine rests near my keyboard, a sports drink in my hand, and a blanket is by my chair. Cold and flu season is upon us, and even lowly swim writers are prone to fever and chills.

The members of my team are some of the most judgmental people I've ever known. Recently I've distanced myself from the team and now I feel completely left out in the cold. Any advice on what I should do?

I have been swimming since I was six years old and have loved it. Last spring, I injured my shoulder and since returning to the pool, swimming doesn't bring me happiness like it used to, and I'm confused about what to do next.

Dear Mike: Just recently I’ve started swimming on a USA Swimming club. In the past, I’ve always been able to stay on top of my schoolwork and keep up with it, but lately it’s been a bit challenging. I haven’t exactly been keeping up with work, and I struggle to finish it every night.

I’m not a fan of cliché stereotypes that begin with, “There are two types of parents in the world…” but there are definitely two types of parents in the swimming world: The parent that builds, and the parent that breaks.

I have been swimming on a winter swim team since I was about 8 and loved swimming. I am 12 now and this year I was invited to join a more advanced group. Now I realize it is really tiring me out. What can I do?

I have recently started swimming on my new college team. And I am slowly feeling more and more like I made the wrong decision by choosing this college. How do I get the passion I had in high school back?

A few weeks ago, I spoke with a college swim coach who told me something horrifying, although not unsurprising. We were discussing the potential unionization of collegiate athletes, and possibly the ramifications extended to non-revenue Olympic men’s sports, like NCAA swimming. “Collegiate swimming might not even exist in 10 years,” he said.

Last summer I had a knee injury and I couldn't swim for about 4 months. Now that I'm back in the water, how do I regain my confidence level and how do I push myself to work hard and to actually try my hardest?

I’m reaching out to you because I am 8 days out from the most important meet of my career to date. I had been throwing down nasty pace times so that I could get my first Senior Nationals cut. But about two days ago, my body started falling apart.

One summer a few years ago, I was at a beach near the Pacific Ocean and decided to go for a swim. I didn't know I was in danger. The sun was high. The sky was a beautiful blue. I heard seagulls somewhere.

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